First, there’s all those wasted Saturday mornings trying to stick to a totally unfeasible schedule of zig-zagging across the city to make it to your 15 shortlisted homes within the space of an hour.

Finally you find the rental property that dreams are made of but that doesn’t mean it’s yours. Now you have to expeditiously gather together your pay slips, identification, rental history and references, race it across to the real estate agent and then bat those eyelids like you’ve never batted them before.

Then the good news: you’ve been offered the home and you are being ushered into a room to sign the lease.

While you might have a several questions to ask first, it can be intimidating because as a tenant, you aren’t always in a strong bargaining position, advocacy and research officer from the NSW Tenants’ Union Leo Patterson Ross says.

“While tenants are under a lot of scrutiny, landlords aren’t,” says Patterson Ross.

But instead of signing furiously on the dotted line, at least stop to consider these six things.

Check strata by-laws for any restrictive terms not mentioned in your rental agreement. Photo: Will Sullivan

1. Are there any restrictive terms in the lease?

Once you’ve been given the lease, read it over and make sure you don’t notice any strange and restrictive terms included in the agreement, like curfews.

Firstly, demanding that tenants have to be home by a certain time at night is illegal.

But it’s also a strong warning sign that your landlord is uptight and may have problems with normal adult behaviour.

2. Has your landlord disclosed all ‘material facts’?

Because disclosing “material facts” in a tenancy agreement is quite new to NSW, and there’s no real way to enforce it, there’s no harm in asking or reminding your landlord or real estate agent.

This could include asking whether a murder has been committed in the house you want to lease, or what free parking options are available to you.

Your landlord must tell you if you can’t get a free residential parking permit and only paid parking is available.

According to The NSW Tenants Union, your landlord must disclose the following six pieces of information if relevant:

1. The premises has been subject to serious flooding or bushfire in the last five years.

2. The premises has significant health or safety risks that aren’t apparent on inspection.

3. The premises has been the scene of a serious violent crime in the last five years.

4. Council waste services will be different from others in the council area.

5. You can’t get a free residential parking permit (in an area where only paid parking is available).

6. The premises have a driveway or walkway that others can legally use.

3. Is your landlord intending to sell while you are there?

If you’ve just moved in, the last thing you want to do is move out again two months later because the home has been re-sold.

Your landlord is obligated to tell you if they propose to sell the property – to be specific, that means they have to have prepared a contract for the sale of the premises.

While it might be worth asking if you have a hunch, you should be aware that things change, and just because a landlord decides to sell, doesn’t mean it has been in the works for a while (they might just have had a random offer).

4. Can you make alterations to the place?

This is a hard one – you have to seek consent for making cosmetic alterations to the home but you have to weigh up whether to bring it up or not before actually signing a lease.

On one hand, the fact that you want to add a fresh coat of paint to the walls may be a selling point and your landlord may be very happy for you to do it at your own expense.

On the other hand, revealing your plans to say, add a deck, to the home you are about to rent might not go down well with the landlord and could mean getting bumped down the list of potential tenants.

It’s not necessary to bring up drilling holes and painting walls before signing a lease – unless it’s a deal breaker.

5. What rules does strata have?

Under the current laws, the landlord or real estate agent has to give you the building’s by-laws within seven days of you signing a lease.

It may be worth asking to see the strata by-laws before signing the lease, as the building strata might be have different or more stringent rules than your landlord.

While it may not be mentioned in your lease, strata might have rules about pets, smoking, noise or even what can be displayed on your balcony (for example maybe you aren’t allowed plants or to dry your clothes outside).

6. How often has the home been leased in the last few years?

You don’t need to ask this one out loud, but it could be worth doing some research to see what the turnover rate of tenants has been in the property you are interested in. You can check online here.

If the property has been advertised 10 times within two years, it might be an indication that, for whatever reason, your future there may also be short-lived.

Check to make sure strata doesn’t have any strange terms in their by-laws.